Two former Sterling Financial mortgage loan officers have sued the lender on claims that they are owed unpaid overtime.

David and Micah DuBeau, who are brothers, filed the lawsuit on Sept. 6 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Oregon. The lawsuit seeks class-action status.

Sterling, a $9.6 billion-asset depository in Spokane, Wash., had not filed a legal response as of Tuesday morning. Spokeswoman Cara Coon was not immediately available for comment.

The brothers accuse Sterling of requiring its mortgage loan officers to work more than 40 hours a week but failing "to pay them overtime by illegally classifying all such employees as exempt from the overtime requirements," the lawsuit states. The brothers also claim that Sterling illegally deducted from their wages certain costs that mortgage loan officers incurred as part of their jobs, such as appraisal fees.

The DuBeaus worked for in the Medford, Ore., office of Golf Savings Bank, a Mountlake Terrace, Wash., thrift that Sterling bought in August 2010.